Signs of Hope — How the Cedar Rapids Pub­lic Library Over­came a Flood

In 2008, a flood con­sid­ered by the Fed­er­al Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency (FEMA) to be ​“one of the worst and most cost­ly floods in Iowa – and even U.S. his­to­ry” com­plete­ly destroyed the Cedar Rapids down­town Pub­lic Library build­ing, along with half of the library’s collection.

After leas­ing space at the West­dale Mall and con­sol­i­dat­ing the col­lec­tion with books from oth­er libraries, the town of Cedar Rapids even­tu­al­ly began con­struc­tion of a new down­town Pub­lic Library in 2012.

The sign sys­tem was designed by OPN Archi­tects with whom Lat­i­tude worked direct­ly by pro­vid­ing a com­plete sign pack­age (inte­ri­or, exte­ri­or, and donor recog­ni­tion wall).

The library reopened in August 2013 and saw over 600,000 vis­its from the com­mu­ni­ty in its first year of ser­vice. What a great success!

Watch the fol­low­ing video to see the final out­door brand­ing being com­plet­ed: https://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​0​6​I​k​X​F​p​H​E​F​o​&​f​e​a​t​u​r​e​=​y​o​u​tu.be